Wednesday, July 26, 2006

Shmoos Can Travel

Here's four-year-old little shmoo (back when he was still a little shmoo), on a summer campout. Shmoo has always been an enthusiastic hiker, camper, and traveler, and tomorrow we're heading out on another Big Adventure!

If your family is planning some vacation and travel adventures this summer, you might want to check out the article I wrote recently for kidscantravel.com: Eating Vegan on the Road.

The article had to be brief, but I really wanted to say a bit more about the link I included to Mary Jane's Farm. Her organic instant meal packets were a revelation to us on our last campout. Do a search on the word "vegan" and you'll see they have quite a selection (including brownies!). We loved the Couscous & Lentil Curry, Velvety Black Bean Soup, Black Bean Hummus, and Pinto Bean Flakes.

Happy summer holidays, everyone, and if your plans include a sing-along around a roaring campfire, don't forget the vegan marshmallows!

The only thing I want to comment on is refried beans. Although they sound like a veggie item (and, in our household, it certainly IS), restaurant refried beans are often made with lard (I think mostly pig...). I've also found that the people at these restaurants have NO CLUE what's in their refried beans, unless they made it from scratch.

Aww, what a cute little shmoo! By the way, I love the book cover #1, glad it's the finalist. Can't wait for the book. And thanks for the marshmallow link! Too bad about the corn syrup, but junk food is junk food I suppose, vegan or not.

Of course that can happen. Also, Indian restaurants often use ghee (clarified butter), Thai restaurants almost always use fish sauce and oyster sauce, and many restaurants cook their rice in chicken broth and their vegetables in butter. The article just couldn't be long enough to cover all these kinds of possibilities, so I had to hope that most vegans will know enough to check for things like that.

This is the first time this summer that I've been able to check the blog, and what a nice coincidence - I am currently planning a very LONG (9+ hours each way, plus stops) road trip with my 3 year old and one year old. My head is spinning with all of the planning this requires (food related and otherwise!), so I'm glad you've spelled out a little bit of it for me. I don't think I want to chance placing an order with Mary Jane's Farm to Canada this close to our departure, but I'm definitely going to keep them in mind for next time. Looks great!!

i love the challenge of finding food all over, we once drove to disney world in florida, and using a book i found some interesting places on the way that we would never have found otherwise, and my non veg exteneded family even enjoyed the adventure. Then using a vegetarian guide to disney world we even discovered tofutti at the ice cream parlour among many other secrets!

i love your blog, i'm a new reader, and as a single working mom, i need all the motivation and inspiration i can get to avoid daily pb&J and applesauce, your are helping...

Thanks for the link to Mary Jane's! What awesome stuff! And thanks too for your blog! I've been reading it for a while (and catching up on previous posts) and you've really inspired me to go vegan. Thanks! and ... i can't wait till your book comes out!

What a cutie he is!!! He should be on a bar of vegan friendly soap. He has that perfect complexion thing going on. :) Maybe Dirty Kitty has a spot for him? They make soap products for vegans...just a thought...I'd buy anything with that face on it. :)

*Also, not all mexican restaurants use lard in their beans, my friends parents own a place and as funny as thsi will sound my dog cannot eat anything that comes from a pig .....i have NO idea why but if its from a pig he gets sick, but anyway yea so everytime i go down to their place his mom would let him in and make him a special doggy tostada and made the bean paste from scratch everytime without any lard, so i'm sure if you ask they'll try to accomidate if they can.